September 2019 Monthly Running Challenge

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Hello everyone I've just found that community
My name is Ana, from Bulgaria, and I hope you will apologize my not very good English ☺️.
I am a newbie runner- running since January, but not very consistent. The biggest distance I've run is 5km(33 minutes). My goal is to run 2 times a week, 5 km, for the best time I can.
I know that is not much, but I'm doing other sports and running is additional. Because I like it, and because I need endurance

If you don't mind me asking, where exactly did you park? I don't think I'm at much risk as I normally park at the visitor center and if I'm running Greenline, I'll go past the bison to get there. So maybe more out of curiosity and where to watch.

I was at the GreenWAY which is a different trail system entirely - go west down Walnut Grove, turn southeast and follow Humphreys boulevard until it turns into Wolf River Boulevard, the trailhead is the one just over the line into Germantown. It’s confusing but there is both a Greenline and an unconnected Greenway in the Wolf River bottoms (although the trail systems do meet up if you cross under Walnut Grove). If you look on Google earth where we were is labeled Germantown Greenway west parking lot, roughly across from the opera house. It’s also where the Greenway bathrooms are, which is why we park there.

The Shelby Farms visitor center used to be notorious for vehicle break ins, but we haven’t had a problem there since all the renovations a few years back, and it seems like most of the time there’s enough foot traffic that it would discourage people. The parking areas up by Pine Lake and Mullins Station are still bad though. According to the cops today the whole trail area gets hit fairly regularly.

We sort of knew it would happen eventually and made a point not to leave “valuables” in the car, without really thinking how all our random little stuff added up to quite a dollar sum.

Anyway I hope whoever stole my extra socks feels proud when they go through our stuff and find a diabetes testing kit and an asthma inhaler. So stupid.

Let's hope the police get some useful prints and make an arrest that ends in a successful prosecution.

January Total: 131k
February Total: 159.5k
March Total: 183k
April Total: 126k
May Total: 128k
June Total: 161.5k
July Total: 151k
August Total: 133k

Monthly average: 146.6k

Next year when you pop in here claiming your December 2019 mileage, what accomplishments will you have made?
Run at least 4 5k races.
Get under 30:00 and a PR for 5k.
Average at least 135k per month, which would put me over 1,000 miles for the year.

If you don't mind me asking, where exactly did you park? I don't think I'm at much risk as I normally park at the visitor center and if I'm running Greenline, I'll go past the bison to get there. So maybe more out of curiosity and where to watch.

I was at the GreenWAY which is a different trail system entirely - go west down Walnut Grove, turn southeast and follow Humphreys boulevard until it turns into Wolf River Boulevard, the trailhead is the one just over the line into Germantown. It’s confusing but there is both a Greenline and an unconnected Greenway in the Wolf River bottoms (although the trail systems do meet up if you cross under Walnut Grove). If you look on Google earth where we were is labeled Germantown Greenway west parking lot, roughly across from the opera house. It’s also where the Greenway bathrooms are, which is why we park there.

The Shelby Farms visitor center used to be notorious for vehicle break ins, but we haven’t had a problem there since all the renovations a few years back, and it seems like most of the time there’s enough foot traffic that it would discourage people. The parking areas up by Pine Lake and Mullins Station are still bad though. According to the cops today the whole trail area gets hit fairly regularly.

We sort of knew it would happen eventually and made a point not to leave “valuables” in the car, without really thinking how all our random little stuff added up to quite a dollar sum.

Anyway I hope whoever stole my extra socks feels proud when they go through our stuff and find a diabetes testing kit and an asthma inhaler. So stupid.

Ah, I didn't even realize there was another whole trail system. And yes, there is always a ton of foot traffic there at the visitor center. I drive a Prius and even park in one of the hybrid parking stalls if possible. It's so close to the building, the wheelhouse, and the road that it would be unlikely for someone to be able to find much of a time window to break into my car. Even if someone were as far away as the bathrooms, they would hear the car alarm and see it.

Although it seems odd to recommend a place where we were just victims of crime, I wanted to point out that the Germantown Greenway is actually our favorite trail system for short to medium runs - perfectly beautiful trails along the Wolf and assorted creeks and lakes, and it’s very easy to get a 5 or 6 mile run out of it without passing the same spot twice. Plus about 4 miles of medium quality trail (some gullies, tree roots, mostly even single track) back in the woods. We haven’t been hit in two years before now, but if you ever want to try it out without parking where we did, the east end of the Greenway emerges right next to the Breakaway Running on Germantown road, and there’s a large group that meets up there to run.

Also, I keep meaning to mention my favorite place to eat along there would be a good spot for you as a dedicated carnivore stopping in Memphis. The One & Only BBQ (on Germantown road, a block away from where Walnut Grove hits it) will be happy to serve nothing but smoked meat with no added sauce, and they have chicken as well as beef brisket and pulled pork. The dry rub ribs might have some sugar in the rub but it seems to be very little. It’s not the best bbq in Memphis by a long shot, but they open early and close late, seating and staff are pleasant, and the owner is a runner.

@Anitchka16 welcome, we're glad to have you here! Don't worry about your English, you post was easy to understand and your English is much, much better than my Bulgarian.

@rheddmobile that just sucks! Why do some people have to be such *kitten*!

@martaindale awesome race! particularly in light of the disorganization. Hopefully they do get that worked out because it certainly is a great cause.

@shanaber I would LOVE a tour of a nuclear reactor! I used to design electrical systems for power plants, but never for a nuke.

7 trail miles last night doing a bit of reconnaissance and trail maintenance for the Friday night group run I'm planning (17 miles on Friday the 13th, full moon, 7pm until midnight!). I organized it on our local trail running group FB page and it looks we'll have 15 people showing up...not bad for my first FB event. Temperature should be in the 50's but with cloud cover so I'm not sure we'll be able to see the moon.

Odd thing about the run...Garmin is showing that I ran it on Tuesday and not last night. My Garmin shows the correct time and date so I have no idea what happened. Hopefully it's just an anomaly.

If you don't mind me asking, where exactly did you park? I don't think I'm at much risk as I normally park at the visitor center and if I'm running Greenline, I'll go past the bison to get there. So maybe more out of curiosity and where to watch.

I was at the GreenWAY which is a different trail system entirely - go west down Walnut Grove, turn southeast and follow Humphreys boulevard until it turns into Wolf River Boulevard, the trailhead is the one just over the line into Germantown. It’s confusing but there is both a Greenline and an unconnected Greenway in the Wolf River bottoms (although the trail systems do meet up if you cross under Walnut Grove). If you look on Google earth where we were is labeled Germantown Greenway west parking lot, roughly across from the opera house. It’s also where the Greenway bathrooms are, which is why we park there.

The Shelby Farms visitor center used to be notorious for vehicle break ins, but we haven’t had a problem there since all the renovations a few years back, and it seems like most of the time there’s enough foot traffic that it would discourage people. The parking areas up by Pine Lake and Mullins Station are still bad though. According to the cops today the whole trail area gets hit fairly regularly.

We sort of knew it would happen eventually and made a point not to leave “valuables” in the car, without really thinking how all our random little stuff added up to quite a dollar sum.

Anyway I hope whoever stole my extra socks feels proud when they go through our stuff and find a diabetes testing kit and an asthma inhaler. So stupid.

Ah, I didn't even realize there was another whole trail system. And yes, there is always a ton of foot traffic there at the visitor center. I drive a Prius and even park in one of the hybrid parking stalls if possible. It's so close to the building, the wheelhouse, and the road that it would be unlikely for someone to be able to find much of a time window to break into my car. Even if someone were as far away as the bathrooms, they would hear the car alarm and see it.

Although it seems odd to recommend a place where we were just victims of crime, I wanted to point out that the Germantown Greenway is actually our favorite trail system for short to medium runs - perfectly beautiful trails along the Wolf and assorted creeks and lakes, and it’s very easy to get a 5 or 6 mile run out of it without passing the same spot twice. Plus about 4 miles of medium quality trail (some gullies, tree roots, mostly even single track) back in the woods. We haven’t been hit in two years before now, but if you ever want to try it out without parking where we did, the east end of the Greenway emerges right next to the Breakaway Running on Germantown road, and there’s a large group that meets up there to run.

Also, I keep meaning to mention my favorite place to eat along there would be a good spot for you as a dedicated carnivore stopping in Memphis. The One & Only BBQ (on Germantown road, a block away from where Walnut Grove hits it) will be happy to serve nothing but smoked meat with no added sauce, and they have chicken as well as beef brisket and pulled pork. The dry rub ribs might have some sugar in the rub but it seems to be very little. It’s not the best bbq in Memphis by a long shot, but they open early and close late, seating and staff are pleasant, and the owner is a runner.

Thank you for the suggestion, I'll have to check it out this weekend.

Last Sun., I found the Brickhouse buffet in Bartlett. It was very good, had BBQ ribs on the buffet, meatloaf, shrimp, and then had a carving station with prime rib roast, ham, filet mignon, and even a turkey. I keep wanting to go back for more of that prime rib, but I think that is a Sunday item. I'm thinking of visiting on Sat. this weekend and will check those spots out before heading down.

ETA: I looked online and it seems like I can park where I normally would and just go south to get to the Greenway instead of north to get to the Greenline... from what I can tell, I just go half-way around the lake next to the visitor center before breaking off to go southwest. I know I have seen the bike crossing signs at a major intersection on the east-west road that goes by Shelby Farms.

But the map I found online shows an intersection with the Greenline that is "under construction." I can't recall seeing this intersection, but have run on some of the dirt trails along the Wolf River accessible from the Greenline (west of the jail). I guess I will have to explore from the other direction heading towards the Greenline to see what I find.

@Anitchka16 welcome, we're glad to have you here! Don't worry about your English, you post was easy to understand and your English is much, much better than my Bulgarian.

@rheddmobile that just sucks! Why do some people have to be such *kitten*!

@martaindale awesome race! particularly in light of the disorganization. Hopefully they do get that worked out because it certainly is a great cause.

@shanaber I would LOVE a tour of a nuclear reactor! I used to design electrical systems for power plants, but never for a nuke.

7 trail miles last night doing a bit of reconnaissance and trail maintenance for the Friday night group run I'm planning (17 miles on Friday the 13th, full moon, 7pm until midnight!). I organized it on our local trail running group FB page and it looks we'll have 15 people showing up...not bad for my first FB event. Temperature should be in the 50's but with cloud cover so I'm not sure we'll be able to see the moon.

Odd thing about the run...Garmin is showing that I ran it on Tuesday and not last night. My Garmin shows the correct time and date so I have no idea what happened. Hopefully it's just an anomaly.

@7lenny7 are you aware of FullMoonRuuners? They have some pretty cool groups in lots of different places all over the world. I haven't managed to be in the right place to join one yet but hope to some day

@7lenny7 - You can look up the history of Hanford online. It was the primary plutonium production site for WWII. Of course it is closed now and there is a cleanup going on but he found it fascinating, how it was built (by Dupont) and how it functioned. We went to Los Alamos, NM earlier this year and that is also a fascinating place. We spent a day there and I think he could have spent even longer.

Congratulations @martaindale on a great race despite the chaos and confusion!

No run for me today as we are heading back to Boise. I will run a short run tomorrow then Saturday is packet pickup! I am getting pretty excited for the race! I did get in almost 22k steps yesterday with all our running and walking along the river here and 9 miles total per the watch.

On our way back to Boise we are going to stop at the Pendleton Woolen Mills for a tour. It has been in the current location since 1909 in of course Pendleton OR. I can remember having their jackets and shirts when I was a kid. I am pretty excited about going there but we don't have a lot of use for the wool products in CA 😁

I made up Monday's intervals yesterday (Scheduled Rest Day). Ran 2.5 at a nice pace, then ran 8 1/4s at 7:08 pace. I accidentally reset the treadmill about .5M before the intervals started so I had to do some fancy math in my head to add my times and distances together. Today I'm going to do my long run of 90 minutes and 9 miles (I make myself hit both distance and time) but lucky me gets to do this on the treadmill since the park is now closed for the weekend. Oh well. It won't be fun, but it's necessary. And I have to change the litter in the cat box when I get back so that's always something to look forward to. <eyeroll> I want to train my cat to pee and poop in the toilet.

9/1: 8.86 miles
9/3: 6.31 miles
9/4: 6.25 miles
9/5: 6.25 miles
9/8: 10.55 miles
9/10: 6.25 miles
9/11: 6.25 miles
9/12: 6.26 miles

56.98/110 miles completed

I really enjoyed my run this morning. I ran 6.26 miles. I listened to Zombies Run, but I turned the chases off since I just wanted to do an easy run. I ended up with a pace of 10.25 which is pretty decent for me. It was only 72°F this morning and even though the humidity was 87% and the dew point was 68°, it didn't seem too bad. I saw the high school cross country team at the park. Most of them did not look too enthusiastic about being up there at 6:30 in the morning. But I was enjoying myself. Some days the uneventful runs where you just run are the best ones!

@martaindale Great job on your race! Hopefully it will be better organized next time.

@shanaber What a lovely place to run/walk. Hobbes looks like he enjoyed it too!

Good morning all! Looking at a full moon on tomorrow Friday the 13th.... can we tell how excited I am about how my students will be? Looking at locking up my 2020 race calendar in the near future. I hope you are all having a Runderful Thursday!

@7lenny7 are you aware of FullMoonRuuners? They have some pretty cool groups in lots of different places all over the world. I haven't managed to be in the right place to join one yet but hope to some day

@eleanorhawkins I hadn't heard of them and looking online, I can't find anything near here. I think Spain had a group. It's not so much that I seek full moon runs, as much as the timing of this one was perfect as it's on a Friday the 13th and I was actually wanting to schedule a group night run on this particular course. It just all came together.

@shanaber now that's a different kind of power than what i worked with!

If you don't mind me asking, where exactly did you park? I don't think I'm at much risk as I normally park at the visitor center and if I'm running Greenline, I'll go past the bison to get there. So maybe more out of curiosity and where to watch.

I was at the GreenWAY which is a different trail system entirely - go west down Walnut Grove, turn southeast and follow Humphreys boulevard until it turns into Wolf River Boulevard, the trailhead is the one just over the line into Germantown. It’s confusing but there is both a Greenline and an unconnected Greenway in the Wolf River bottoms (although the trail systems do meet up if you cross under Walnut Grove). If you look on Google earth where we were is labeled Germantown Greenway west parking lot, roughly across from the opera house. It’s also where the Greenway bathrooms are, which is why we park there.

The Shelby Farms visitor center used to be notorious for vehicle break ins, but we haven’t had a problem there since all the renovations a few years back, and it seems like most of the time there’s enough foot traffic that it would discourage people. The parking areas up by Pine Lake and Mullins Station are still bad though. According to the cops today the whole trail area gets hit fairly regularly.

We sort of knew it would happen eventually and made a point not to leave “valuables” in the car, without really thinking how all our random little stuff added up to quite a dollar sum.

Anyway I hope whoever stole my extra socks feels proud when they go through our stuff and find a diabetes testing kit and an asthma inhaler. So stupid.

Ah, I didn't even realize there was another whole trail system. And yes, there is always a ton of foot traffic there at the visitor center. I drive a Prius and even park in one of the hybrid parking stalls if possible. It's so close to the building, the wheelhouse, and the road that it would be unlikely for someone to be able to find much of a time window to break into my car. Even if someone were as far away as the bathrooms, they would hear the car alarm and see it.

Although it seems odd to recommend a place where we were just victims of crime, I wanted to point out that the Germantown Greenway is actually our favorite trail system for short to medium runs - perfectly beautiful trails along the Wolf and assorted creeks and lakes, and it’s very easy to get a 5 or 6 mile run out of it without passing the same spot twice. Plus about 4 miles of medium quality trail (some gullies, tree roots, mostly even single track) back in the woods. We haven’t been hit in two years before now, but if you ever want to try it out without parking where we did, the east end of the Greenway emerges right next to the Breakaway Running on Germantown road, and there’s a large group that meets up there to run.

Also, I keep meaning to mention my favorite place to eat along there would be a good spot for you as a dedicated carnivore stopping in Memphis. The One & Only BBQ (on Germantown road, a block away from where Walnut Grove hits it) will be happy to serve nothing but smoked meat with no added sauce, and they have chicken as well as beef brisket and pulled pork. The dry rub ribs might have some sugar in the rub but it seems to be very little. It’s not the best bbq in Memphis by a long shot, but they open early and close late, seating and staff are pleasant, and the owner is a runner.

Thank you for the suggestion, I'll have to check it out this weekend.

Last Sun., I found the Brickhouse buffet in Bartlett. It was very good, had BBQ ribs on the buffet, meatloaf, shrimp, and then had a carving station with prime rib roast, ham, filet mignon, and even a turkey. I keep wanting to go back for more of that prime rib, but I think that is a Sunday item. I'm thinking of visiting on Sat. this weekend and will check those spots out before heading down.

ETA: I looked online and it seems like I can park where I normally would and just go south to get to the Greenway instead of north to get to the Greenline... from what I can tell, I just go half-way around the lake next to the visitor center before breaking off to go southwest. I know I have seen the bike crossing signs at a major intersection on the east-west road that goes by Shelby Farms.

But the map I found online shows an intersection with the Greenline that is "under construction." I can't recall seeing this intersection, but have run on some of the dirt trails along the Wolf River accessible from the Greenline (west of the jail). I guess I will have to explore from the other direction heading towards the Greenline to see what I find.

I believe the connection marked under construction has been finished now, if it’s the stretch of gravel road passing under walnut grove.

Yesterday I got to run 1.67 miles. I’d planned more, but found out just before I was going to leave that I’d left my good shoes in the trunk of the car, which my husband had taken to work. I decided to run in my old shoes, which I’ve been using exclusively for walking since early this spring. Of course now I have no idea if my various aches and pains were from the shoes or from still recovering from Sunday, but either way, I decided to keep the run short and I’m glad I went out anyhow. It might not be a bad idea to move a second pair of shoes into rotation, but we’re tight on cash right now. So it goes.

Lots and lots of rain today, so instead of going to the gym I’ve decided to catch up on work and play with my training schedule. I feel good about cutting the 26K, because as much as it sounded like fun, I just didn’t feel like I had the time to train for it properly. One under-trained race per year is quite enough for me.

So now I have two much more achievable-feeling goals for the next month: get ready for the 10K/10Mile races on the Twin Cities Marathon weekend, and pacing @7Lenny7 at the Loopet Loppet the week after that. I figure in both cases the main issue is going to be running while tired, not the distances per-se. So next weekend I’ve got an all-day walking event on Saturday, and then on Sunday I’m planning to bike 4 miles to the trailhead where the Loppet is going to be held and run the course plus a little bit on each end (7.4 miles). The next weekend I’m thinking I’ll run the long route to the gym (3.5 miles) on Saturday, then put in a long slow run on Sunday (9.4 miles).

Given those adjustments, I’m lowering my monthly goal from 70 miles to 60. The spirit is willing, fingers crossed that the legs are too.

@Anitchka16: Welcome! 5K is one of the few metric units I can actually convert in my head. I wonder why! I'd say running because you like it is probably the best reason out there to run, followed by the endurance benefits.

September 1 – 8.17 miles
September 2 – 4.2 miles
September 4 – 6 miles
September 5 – 8.5 miles
September 7 – 8 miles
September 9 – 4.72 miles (am) and 1 mile (pm bootcamp pre-test)
September 10 – 45 minutes weight conditioning
September 11 – 5.01 miles
September 12 – 5.11 miles

Total – 50.71 miles of 100 mile goal

I’ve ran the past two days while attending a conference in Orlando, FL. Holy smoke Batman, it’s humid down here! I don’t know how you do it @ddmom0811. My splits certainly reflected the weather. I was as slow as an elephant in molasses.

@rheddmobile I'm sorry to hear about your car, that's so annoying, and replacing all that stuff will be an expensive pain. That sucks!

@Anitchka16 welcome! I'm just over the border in Romania. You have a beautiful country, I was in Sofia in May and it was great, I loved having the mountains right there by the city! I've been to Bansko as well and loved it. Hoping to go to Veliko Tarnova soon. Where abouts are you?

Just ran a lovely 8.4km in the forest. Scared myself silly seeing a snake, then laughed myself hoarse at a girl on rollerblades trying to walk two dogs, they tied her up in knots and then pulled her over. Twice.